Verizon Wireless tomorrow will cut the price of data service for their PDA and Smartphone devices.
Previously, Verizon has held the highest rate in the country for mobile data on smart devices. At $45/month before voice plans, it has been cheaper to purchase a second phone on Sprint SERO (which includes unlimited data and 500 airtime minutes for $30/month).
The change is timed to conincide with the launch of the HTC XV6900; Verizon’s version of the HTC Touch (identical except in name and branding). Now, both PDAs and Smartphones on Verizon will only be charged $29.99/month.
Both Verizon and AT&T continue to engage in device discrimination. For example, AT&T charges $30/month for PDA & Smartphone owners, while only charging $19.99/month for regular phones and iPhone. Sprint Nextel has lead the charge in charging a single rate for data, $15/month for all phones, PDAs, and smartphones on their network.
I’m pretty sure that AT&T charges $15 for regular phones now.
No, it’s $30 for PDA plans. MEdia Net technically is unsupported on PDA phones. MEdia Net unlimited is $15, but generally is bundled with 200 SMS and sold for $19.99. The $15 plan is an un-promoted option.
If you walk into an AT&T store, or order a phone online, you get the $30 plan. Customer service is not supposed to switch your plan unless you change the IMEI on your account to be a non-smartphone.
However, once you are on the MEdia Net plan, there isn’t any problem with using it on a PDA or Smartphone. In fact, it will work with any device that uses the wap.cingular gateway.
In fairness, Sprint recently started requiring $25+ data packs (or an everything plan) to receive mail-in rebates on PDAs and smartphones or $30+ for blackberry devices. PDAs and smartphones, aside from Blackberries, still work with $15 data plans but the mail-in rebates require $25+ data packs.
While that is correct, you can step back down to the $15/month Vision pack after receiving your rebate. It’s a mandatory way for Sprint to make you try the higher vision packs… they’ve been toying around with that for a good five years now.
On Verizon, the system won’t let you change packs… and on AT&T customer care is trained to deny the change.
[…] feed. Thanks for visiting!Verizon has long been reviled for its $45/month smartphone data plans. As Phone News notes, that caused many people to opt for a second device with Sprint’s SERO service, which is $30 […]